Texas 1992 Base Plate
1992–1998Texas · base · “The Lone Star State”
The 1990 plate with THE LONE STAR STATE added along the foot, the motto the Texas plate has carried ever since. It ran twice: from 1992 until the statehood plate replaced it at the end of 1995, and again from mid 1996 until February 1998, when the flag moved across the plate. Two runs, one design, so the archive holds it once. The plate shown is a reconstruction carrying an invented serial, so no real registration is depicted.
One plate, several years
This design served from 1992 to 1998 rather than for a single year. A plate that stays on a car across several registrations cannot date itself, so the year is proved separately, by a tab or sticker in the earlier period and by a windscreen sticker later. It is the opposite arrangement to the annual plates, where the plate WAS the registration.
Stamped, not printed
Every character here is pressed into the metal and stands proud of the surface, along with the raised rim just inside the edge. Run a hand across it and you feel the whole design. The plate was struck from flat stock in a press, then the raised faces were rolled with paint, which is why wear shows first on the tops of the characters.
Sources
Reference photograph of an issued 1993 plate (CC BY-SA 4.0, AllenLow). Both issue periods and the serial format (CC BY-SA).
- Issued
- Standard issue
- The plate you received by default when you registered a vehicle.
- Serial format
- AAA-99A
- Material
- Embossed aluminium with reflective sheeting
- Source license
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Reference
- View original